1900, 108,027, including 30,800 persons of foreign birth and 2900 of negro descent.
In 1637 a small company of Puritans under John Davenport, their pastor, and Theopliilus Eaton, a wealthy London merchant, arrived in Boston, and in the following year settled at New Haven, then called by the Indians Quinnipiac. Adriaen Block had previously visited the place and named it Roodenberg, probably from the reddish color of the soil. In November the new settlers bought from an Indian chief, Momanguin, a large tract of land, for which they paid “twelve coats, twelve alchymy spoons, twelve hatchets, twelve hoes, two dozen of knives, twelve porringers, and four cases of French knives and scissors.” Momanguin agreed that the Indians should not “terrify, disturb, or injure” the whites, who, in return, promised to protect the Indians and extend hunting privileges in part of the ceded territory. In December another tract thirteen miles long and ten miles wide was bought from another Indian chief, Montowese, for thirteen English coats. Immediately after landing the settlers had entered into a ‘plantation covenant,’ but a regular government was not established until the ‘Fundamental and Written Constitution’ was adopted in June, 1639. The privileges of voting and holding office were limited to church members, and the Scriptures were solemnly proclaimed as the supreme and only law in both civil and ecclesiastical affairs. Eaton was chosen as first Governor, and by successive elections was retained in this office until his death in 1658. In 1640 the settlement received its present name (from Newhaven, England), and three years later it formed with Milford, Guilford, and Stamford (Southhold, L. I., and Branford, Conn., being admitted later) a confederation known as the ‘New Haven Colony,’ which, in the same year, entered the New England Union. From 1660-64 the regicides Goffe and Whalley found shelter in and near New Haven (see above), and from 1670 to his death in 1688, another regicide, Dixwell, lived here under the name of ‘James Davids.’ In 1665, after a long and bitter struggle, the New Haven Colony was united to Connecticut under the Connecticut charter of 1662. In 1701 New Haven was made a joint capital with Hartford, and as such remained until 1873. In 1717 Yale College was moved here from Saybrook. On July 5, 1779, a British force under Generals Tryon and Garth captured the town after fighting sharp skirmishes with the inhabitants, and remained here until the 7th, having lost about 70 killed, while of the Americans 29 were killed and 17 wounded. In 1784 part of New Haven was incorporated as a city. Until its shipping trade was crippled by the Embargo and the War of 1812, New Haven was an important commercial port, but since then its energies have been devoted mainly to manufacturing. Steamboat communication with New York was opened in 1815, and the first railroad was completed in 1848. In 1856 a company left New Haven to help found Wabaunsee, Kan. Fair Haven was annexed in 1870. Consult: Lambert, History of the Colony of New Haven (New Haven, 1838); Kingsley, A Historical Discourse (ib., 1838); Barber and Punderson, History and Antiquities of New Haven (ib., 1870); Levermore, Republic of New Haven (Baltimore, 1880); Atwater, History of the City of New Haven (ib., 1887); id., History of the Colony of New Haven, new ed. (ib., 1902); Bartlett, Historical Sketches of New Haven (ib., 1897); and a brief article in Powell, Historic Towns of the New England States (New York, 1898); Blake, Chronicles of New Haven Green (New Haven, 1898); Baldwin, Stories of Old New Haven (ib., 1902); Papers of the New Haven Colony Historical Society (6 vols., ib., 1865-1900).
NEW HEBRIDES, hĕb′rǐ-dēz. A group of islands in the Pacific Ocean, northeast of New Caledonia, extending from latitude 13° to 20° S., and from longitude 165° to 170° E. (Map: Australasia, J 4). Its total area is estimated at over 5000 square miles. The chief islands are Espiritu Santo, Mallicolo, Pentecost, Maewo, Sandwich, and High Islands. Some of the islands are composed of coral; others are of volcanic origin with several active volcanoes. The soil is fertile. Considerable quantities of sandalwood are exported. The chief agricultural products are the breadfruit, sago palm, banana, yam, pineapple, orange, etc. The climate is unhealthful. Even the natives are not immune from fever, and dysentery makes great ravages among them. The population is steadily decreasing; in 1901 it was estimated at 50,000. The people of this group of islands are Melanesians. They are chiefly dolichocephalic (cranial index, 70.4, but examples as high as 85 are found), very dark in complexion, below the medium in stature (64 inches), and have abundance of woolly hair. They are still in savagery, though under the teachings of Christian missionaries they have abandoned to a large extent head-hunting and cannibalism. Under discipline they become industrious and are a factor in the trade of the Pacific. The languages of New Hebrides belong to the sub-Papuan family everywhere except in Fotuna and Aniwa, and at Mel and Fel in Efat, which are Maori colonies from New Zealand still speaking Maori dialects. The best-known sub-Papuan languages are Epi, Pama, Amboym, Vunmarama, and Sesaki. On the southernmost island, Aneityum, the inhabitants are Christianized, can all read and write, and have over forty schools. The group forms a protectorate administered by a mixed commission of French and English officers.
NEW HOLLAND. The former name for Australia (q.v.).
NEW IBE′RIA. A town and the parish seat of Iberia Parish, La., 12.5 miles west of New Orleans, at the head of navigation on the Bayou Teche, and on the Southern Pacific Railroad (Map: Louisiana, D 3). This section has many natural features of interest, and is the scene of part of Longfellow's Evangeline. Avery's Island is famous for its deposits of rock salt. A Federal Government post-office is (1903) in course of construction, and the city has a public high school library, a fine city hall, and a public market. New Iberia is the centre of a productive agricultural section devoted to the cultivation of sugar-cane, cotton, rice, corn, potatoes, small fruits, and vegetables. It is also of considerable importance as an industrial centre, its establishments including shipyards, foundries and machine shops, a knitting mill, and manufactories of cypress lumber, shingles, sash, doors, and blinds, cypress cisterns and tanks, cotton-seed products, soap, tabasco sauce, pressed
